Archive for July, 2009

C2 Hot Talent – August 2009

Friday, July 31st, 2009

Did you know August is National Foot Care Month?  What better way take care of your feet than to walk barefoot in the grass and enjoy the last vestiges of summer by getting out the office earlier!  C2 can help..see our HOT TALENT in Milwaukee and Madison to let you catch a break!  Four hours, four days or forever! C2 is here when you need us.  And remember, it’s always free to see talent!

Milwaukee Talent

Web Designer and developer all in one package

adria-indulge-spaAdria is an experienced graphic and web designer with a diverse portfolio.  She designed multiple sites including small business, not-for-profit and exclusive corporate clients.  Adria tested solid in Flash and very good in Web Development.  She has Master of Arts with an emphasis in Visual Studies.  She understands and applies solid hand coding. Adria is available part-time or full-time on a project basis only.

Outstanding Creative Director with exceptional ideation skills

brad-flemmingBrad is an accomplished, award-winning creative director with 25 years’ expertise developing and executing all aspects of integrated marketing communications campaigns designed to meet and exceed strategic marketing objectives. Very strong in concept development and art/photo direction. Experience in a broad range of B2B and B2C categories. Proven creative leadership talent with demonstrated strength in developing high performance and dedicated teams. Deep understanding of online, print, broadcast, experiential/event marketing. A persuasive presenter and a passionate listener who leverages relationship management talents to achieve consensus across all levels and organizational boundaries.

Quarkalicious Art Director with quintessential production skills

dave-cvetanDave C. tested at exceptional level in Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign/Quark, close to expert levels.  His portfolio reflected good art direction/design skills, and he clearly can take any project from concept to completion. Dave is just completing a long term assignment at Reader’s Digest.  He is available full or part-time, on temporary, temp to hire, or direct hire basis.

Word Up! on this Awesome Designer

paul-r-wild-bluePaul R tested solid+ in Illustrator, Photoshop and Flash and solid in InDesign.  He is a talented designer with strong production skills, and a great portfolio including packaging,  logos and branding, ad campaigns and several web site designs.  Paul performs with speed, accuracy and a delightful attitude.   He is available full or part time, for projects, temp to hire or on a direct hire basis. His portfolio may be viewed at http://prauwerda.com

Multi-faceted Multi-talented Art Director

vanessa-brochureVanessa is a multi-talented art director/graphic designer who can lead a project from concept to completion. She tested very good in Illustrator, Photoshop and solid+ in InDesign. Her portfolio displayed samples of photo editing, branding and identity packages, electronic newsletters, as well as copy writing, PR, brochures, catalogs, books and PowerPoint presentations for mid-size and small businesses. She can also update and edit web pages and banner ads.

Madison Talent

Web savvy, smart and all that!

andrew-glaserAndrew G is a talented problem solver with a passion for aesthetics, web standards and usability.  In his previous role he was at the forefront of user interaction for a Midwest technology company.  He has examples of strategy documents and usability reviews on his website.  Originally a design practitioner for print, he successfully evolved into the interactive space serving as both a web development manager and as a creative director in an interactive agency.  He tested at exceptional level in Illustrator and Photoshop and more than professional in Flash and InDesign. He tested at EXPERT levels in web development. He is available full or part-time on a project or interim basis, temp to hire, or direct hire.

Graphic Designer Ingenue

ashley-dieckmanAshley is an adept disciplined graphic designer with a clear, fresh eye and nicely executed portfolio.  She tested solidly in InDesign and solid+ in both Photoshop and Illustrator.  She presented samples of posters, illustrations, inventive packaging, campaigns, identity and exceptional attention to detail.  She likes clean, simple designs and works to not over design pieces.  Ashley is currently completing a digital editing project in After Effects but was not tested on it.  She works well with others, and is available full or part-time, for projects, temp to hire, or direct hire basis.

Creative, Versatile, Fun and Easy to Work With

brain-lacaire2Brian is a talented graphic designer/creative director for print, video, animation and multimedia.  He is an Expert at Illustrator, exceptional at Photoshop and professional+ with InDesign. He’s spent the majority of his career working on creative teams in agency settings. His portfolio reflected his strong creative/design and solid production capabilities. He is available full or part-time, for projects, temp to hire, or direct hire.

Mega-star Designer/Art Director

meghan-lundy1Meghan is a gem! A multi-talented art director/designer who also has extensive B2B experience in multimedia and web design.   She tested at professional level in Illustrator, Photoshop  and InDesign, exceptional in Dreamweaver and exceptional+ in Flash.  She can art direct a project from concept through creation-in Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, Golive and more.  Exceptional interpersonal communication skills, and still works well well with others. She is available full or part-time, on project, temp to hire or direct hire

Social Media is What You Make of It

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

Recently C2 embarked on a very lofty goal of implementing more social media outlets into our marketing and community outreach. This includes Facebook, Twitter, our blog and other outlets. In talking with others in the “socialsphere” I’ve found that many seem overwhelmed by Twitter or Facebook and I was left scratching my head until I finally asked someone – why?

Come to find out many people simply mismanage their accounts. Which made me think, social media is what you make of it.

Meaning if you choose to use Facebook for business rather than personal use, keep that in mind when you post or subscribe to things. I do admit that I have old classmates and friends on Facebook, but I try and keep the newsfeed traffic streamlined by blocking quizzes and watch out for junk. I do the same with Twitter – after a trip out to Adobe HQ, I ended up following over 40 additional people in my feed. However, after a few days many of them were unfollowed because of an abuse of useless posts. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not the Twitter Czar, but I do like to be able to keep up with my feeds daily and not spend hours sifting through updates.

I also found that if you manage your time on these outlets to important posts or for contacting others, you can really expand your effectiveness and networking capabilities.

You can also increase your online credibility – I post only when I want to, not because I feel that I have to fulfill some unseen need to entertain. I have something to say that I feel is important so I share. Granted, there are businesses out there that have people that do nothing but monitor Tweets and postings, but I am one person and its up to me to control how I use my time. If I feel that Tweeting and posting on Facebook is time well spent (and my employer agrees – ha) then that’s my prerogative.

If you take control of your social media you can make the best of it. If you choose to let it run wild, then you have no one to answer to but yourself. Choose how you will use these great networking social media outlets and then stick with it.

If you still need help with how to manage these outlets, check out this great article from MacWorld.

Multiple Artboards in Illustrator CS4

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

In case you haven’t heard or read our blog (shame on you!), Illustrator CS4 now has multiple artboard capabilities. Using the artboard tool (formerly the crop tool) you can duplicate artboards on the fly using the Option/Alt key and dragging out the board. That’s not the point of this post however. What you may not have known is that you can also duplicate the existing art on an artboard by activating the “Move/Copy Artwork with Artboard” button.

You will find this in the options bar at the top of your page.

This allows you to duplicate items across multiple boards which can be handy when creating web comps or various versions of print materials.

Snow Leopard Desktop Images

Tuesday, July 28th, 2009

The website UneasySilence has released all 35 desktop wallpaper images that will be included with Apple’s newest operating system Snow Leopard (10.5) due to be released this September. All of the images are full 2560×1600 resolution!

Typography Deep Dive – Thursday, August 6

Monday, July 27th, 2009

Everyone loves good typography! And typography, the art and arrangement of type, is arguably InDesign’s biggest strength. Unfortunately many people are never exposed or do not have the time to learn the more subtle aspects of type that can make or break a design. Come join C2’s own InDesign expert James Fritz in an exploration of the often neglected areas of type inside InDesign.

  • How to get great-looking type with a minimum of effort.
  • Maximizing quality by adjusting Hyphenation and Justification settings
  • Creative typographic uses for ordinary characters
  • Understanding (and managing) fonts, families, and glyphs

For more information or to sign up, click here! (15% off)

Who Should Attend?

Whether you use a Mac or Windows, regardless if you’re using InDesign CS3 or CS4, you’ll learn a ton of “use-it-today” techniques in both of these information-packed e-seminars!

Note that when you register for this eSeminar, you’ll have the option to show up live at the event, or watch its recording anytime within two weeks. So no matter what time zone or country you’re in, you can watch and learn at whatever time is best for you!

At the end of each seminar, we’ll open the floor to questions, which you can type into the chat window in your browser. If you can’t attend live, we’ll still attempt to answer your questions via email.

You do not need any special software to view these Webinars — just your normal Web browser and speakers on your computer.

Final Cut Studio 3 Released

Thursday, July 23rd, 2009

I feel required to write something quick about this release.  For all those using this popular software, here are my quick impressions.

Positives:

  • Improved Speed Control in Final Cut (they have been lacking)
  • Greatly improved integration with Color (1st version of Color was somewhat of an eyesore compared to the suite)
  • Greatly improved 3D capabilities of Motion (still not After Effects)
  • Burn DVDs and Blu-rays straight from Compressor

Negatives:

  • STILL NO BLU-RAY MENU OPTIONS OR BURNING FROM DVD STUDIO PRO (sorry about the yelling, but this bugs me)
  • No other upgrades to DVD SP.  Random prediction, but I think Apple is looking to dump this program completely.  It has not been seriously updated in like 6 years (not cited).
  • For those of you that liked LiveType – get used to Motion.  It looks like LiveType has been removed as a stand alone program. (this is actually a plus in my book)
  • 50 GB load of entire studio with the extras.  For those who think Adobe is bloated…if you have this and Creative Suite on the same computer you better have a lot of storage space.

Final Verdict: *shrug*

If you use Motion for your motion graphics, I would definitely say upgrade.  The same goes if you are doing FCP workflow and use Color to do color correction and grading.  Otherwise, not sure how worth it it is, though at $300 for the upgrade, I suppose you might as well.  Would have definitely liked to see some improvements to DVD SP and maybe some other features like the audio transcription that Adobe has been putting into Premiere/Soundbooth/Media Encoder.

I am a little interested in jumping back into Motion, since I have not really seriously used it since the first version of the program.

Let me know if you have any questions or comments.  If you get it and try it, let me know if there is anything really big that I am missing here.

Here is the official Apple site: http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/

 

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